Six Strong Winds, Seven High Seas
by temet nosce
Summary: A moment isn't over until it's understood.


Six Strong Winds, Seven High Seas  
Rating: PG  
Who: vague Jack/Elizabeth, Will  
Summary: A moment isn't over until it's understood.

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1.

He crouches over Elizabeth, the sea on his skin, the medallion in his hand heavier than it should be.

He makes his escape - naturally. His legs aren't made for land, but as he pushes her away, he wants to wipe the salt from her eyes.

2.

Jack plays bumbling, dangerous, and sometimes unconcerned, but he looks at Will and knows perfectly well how a boy's worst fears come to take shape.

3.

Marooned an hour on this island, she discovers his truths are shorter than their phrasing and his voice breaks on the smallest of details. She sees right through his shouted drunken verses, and tells him as much. He just laughs, settles more firmly in the sand, and while the name Jack Sparrow may be immortal, Elizabeth knows the soul that accompanies it is not.

She wakes all dried sweat and sun-soaked shoulders, slightly tangled in his legs, her only coping mechanism: her breathing is quiet and he's more than likely still drunk. It's hard for her to accept any type of silence as she grew up with it, knows the damage it could do.

She stares at the back of his head, the set of his shoulders, his neck that she nearly got a wet taste of the night before. He'd tried to kiss her on the cheek, like a father, but in the end, she turned her head, and pushed him into the sand.

She wants to say something, but doesn't. Instead, she considers the still-burning fire for a moment, and then drags him into the shade before she leaves, as an apology of sorts.

(She will never be trusted with rum, but months after the incident he wakes with a song in his ear, wondering about people who know how to stop.)

4.

He tastes the words he'll never say and lets them build up in the back of his throat. Not blatant innuendos, but un-pirate phrases that are too much and too delicate, like a cloud that cannot hold his weight. Like the way the sea grips at his skin, drawing something from his body, while at the same time preventing him from asking for more.

5.

"It points to the thing you want most in this world."

"Jack." There's a low hum in her half-whisper. With his past, it's hard to be gentle and warm. "Are you telling the truth?"

"Every word, love. And what you want most in this world," he takes her hands, freely offered, palms upward as if seeking absolution instead of direction, "is to find the chest of Davy Jones, is it not?"

"To save Will?"

"By finding the chest of Davy Jones."

The sudden sureness in his voice has her wary, though she remains silent. Her fingers shake as she pockets the compass, but when she steps towards the _Pearl_ with not-Will's hand hovering at her back, it's the most solid she's felt in days.

6.

Will is gone again, keeping a promise or polishing his steadfast morals, which bothered her more than it should He goes further out each time and she knows that eventually coming back is going to be more than he can do, more than she could forgive, and maybe stories like this do end.

She presses herself against Jack, breathes rum and ocean. _Be careful_, she wants to say, but doesn't.

7.

He'd spent the previous night with a bottle of rum, a familiar set of maps with softened edges, and his compass, searching for a way to love her back. Impossible, he decided, and it's more than he can hide.

"I'm Captain Jack Sparrow," he says, apologetically.

There is silence, until she comes up beside him and uses her hands to make him look at her. Her bad edges have him curious, and though he's always refused life when it hurts, he doesn't bother to avoid her eyes.

"And don't I know it," she replies, matter-of-factly, as if it was enough.

8.

Jack walks like an exaltation, a small gust of something, and she'd like to kiss him just once, taste the gold in his mouth. It turns out she gets her chance, thanks to the Kraken and the quasi-honesty of a pirate.

Later, she's jealous of the _Pearl_ for going down with him, and knows that a lie, no matter the sort, always comes with a price.

9.

She still has not married. Will wants to wed the person she was two years ago and she doesn't quite know how to respond to that. What she does know that Jack is alive, somewhere, as men like him only die with some sort of production. Mostly, though, they don't die at all.

After every kiss, Will just looks at her, as if she's leading him to his death, too.

10.

This time, chaos actually precedes Jack and his omnipresent _Pearl_, and it's just like him, becoming part of yet another story worth repeating, save for its truth. Horizon by horizon the sea drops and she always hears his swagger before she sees him.

"Miss Swann." His eyes lift to the ocean over her shoulder. "I must say, I'm somewhat perplexed at the amount of danger our young Will seems to attract."

"You did teach him how to find it well enough," she replies. "He isn't so young anymore." She looks at the worn, sun-stained leather of his tricorn, wonders why dangerous things are always so inviting. "None of us are."

He swallows. She watches the rise and fall of his chest, makes a note of the tattoo on the left side that his shirt keeps hidden. The undead monkey suddenly scurries up to them, startling her.

"Your namesake," she pauses, placing a hand on her chest, as her eyes follow the monkey, "nearly scared me to death."

He moves closer, takes two fingers and presses them against her heart. He has his mother's hands. Her long, wanton digits.

"Thump, thump," he says, his voice rebellious, familiar like a story continually rewriting itself. "Feels fine to me, love."

His fingers, followed by his eyes, start to slide south. She's given up on his touch ever being modest, but gives him another inch before firmly grabbing his arm.

"Next time I'll chop them off," she tells him, gesturing towards his fingers. He yanks his arm away from her.

"Ah." He considers this, purses his lips, and asks, "But you're saying there will be a next time?"

11.

She moves to push past him. He grabs her wrist to stop her, fingers loose like a reminder, arched eyebrow eclipsed by his scarf, and there is a burning in her blood.

"Please," she starts, but holds her tongue, which still tasted like Jack.

His hands are dirty, but his face is clean, sharp with the direction it promised. He lets go. She looks away from him, but not quickly enough.

12.

And there aren't any excuses – how she is trying to never go home. This is her home: the ocean that evaporates even as it keeps her afloat. She's empty and aching without it, but every few months she still collides with Jack, under the guise of Will, telling herself it never made a difference.

She loves him in moments, the way she can't teach him to be still, tell him about stars. She will never hear words in the water that slaps sloppy and wild against the side of _his_ ship. It's what she loves, the ambiguity of it all, actions and reactions that fail to fade. That so many things cannot be held or let go.

13.

"You know," he begins, his words sidling up to her like his body, "there was a time when you couldn't wait to get off this ship." He leans into her like he is bargaining. "Away from us pirates. Isn't that it?"

She freezes. Will isn't around and now her and Jack only have each other on which to focus. It was easy at first to stop at fascinated. She'd read enough to know people start out as clichés. Things happen, one after another, a world without end.


End file.
